Re: Commercial AIM-65 Video Controller?

[dwight via cctalk]

I don't believe the AIM-65 normally does color??

Dwight



From: cctalk  on behalf of Kyle Owen via cctalk 

Sent: Thursday, May 18, 2017 10:08:32 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Commercial AIM-65 Video Controller?

Any idea what this thing is?

https://imgur.com/a/aNFiK

Didn't come up with much of anything with Motion Control, Inc.

I did plug it in, and it seemed to come alive. I tempted fate again and
plugged a composite video source into the input, and a monitor into the
output. One pot on top adjusts the vertical sync, apparently; other than
making the colors slightly weird, the video came through more or less the
same. The other two (marked Y and Z cal) seemed to change nothing. The
switch mounted behind the pots caused the LED display to change (as seen in
the pictures), though the switch mounted closer to the right side of the
unit seemed to make no difference.

When I get done moving, I'll dump the EPROMs and get more pictures,
especially if there's sufficient interest.

Thanks,

Kyle

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Adrian Stoness via cctalk]

My dad had some bills of 5 grand he told me but he was dialing out from a
remote location in northern Manitoba that had only microwave said made huge
difference when he went from 500 baud to 5000

On May 19, 2017 2:40 PM, "jim stephens via cctalk" 
wrote:

>
>
> On 5/19/2017 3:23 AM, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:
>
>> On 18 May 2017 at 17:16, allison via cctalk 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> All a DOS BBS was  was a user interface that provided security by
>>> requiring
>>> user/password
>>> and limiting the commands usable.  The easy was to do that was a version
>>> of
>>> the CMD module
>>> rewritten to not have things like RMDIR and DEL.
>>>
>>
>> I was never into the BBS scene, because outside North America, local
>> phone calls cost money. So you paid for every minute you were online
>> -- quite a lot.
>>
> I have news for you. (maybe) From 1976 until it petered out, the phone
> time cost a lot too.  $200 or more a month at times.
>
> Also a stupid charge for local calls where the PUC's didn't stand up to
> the Bell system or successors and call bullshit to the charges. Calling
> across a few blocks could cost a lot and you wouldn't know it unless you
> were a phone nut due to zone usage metering.
>
> Only with competition in the mid 80s did US long distance start to fall,
> and now with the internet and voice over IP have the need to pay for most
> such long distance gone away for small users.
>
> I put in a couple of T1 based systems for large offices though as recently
> as 7 years ago, and commercially the POTS or digital carrier phone numbers
> carry a huge toll.
> thanks
> Jim
>
>> I used (and still use) CIX (www.cix.co.uk) which was a sort of UK
>> version of BIX, and used offline readers -- you dial up, it sends your
>> comments, zips & grabs all your messages, and disconnects, as fast as
>> possible to keep the phone bill down.
>>
>> But AIUI later-era DOS BBSes often used DESQview to allow multiple
>> multitasking user sessions, and the BBS sysops were often early
>> adopters of OS/2 2.
>>
>> So DOS <> no multitasking...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[jim stephens via cctalk]

On 5/19/2017 7:01 PM, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk wrote:

And if you break one you  have to call HAZMAT.  You did realize that,
didn't you?  They contain mercury and any breakage requires professional
remediation by law!!

I bag and take to the disposal all fluorescent discard, including CFL.

https://www.epa.gov/cfl/what-are-connections-between-mercury-and-cfls

RE: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Bill Gunshannon via cctalk]

From: cctalk [cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] on behalf of jim stephens via 
cctalk [cctalk@classiccmp.org]
Sent: Friday, May 19, 2017 3:46 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

On 5/19/2017 5:13 AM, Peter Corlett via cctalk wrote:
> Anyway, for those of us in Amsterdam who can actually be bothered to find and
> hold down a job, go out and do the shopping, etc, we're replacing blown
> incandescents with LED bulbs because that's what they sell in the shops.
> Incandescent bulbs are exotic specialist items.
The CFL lighting was subsidized by the local California Utilities,
because the state has an incentive for Utilities to either build
efficient plants and expand capacity, or incentivize people to reduce
consumption by some amounts to offset that requirement.

They are doing  the same for some LED lighting now, though not as much
as they did for CFL at this point.

At one point I could buy a flat of 60W CFL's for $2.00, which had maybe
20 bulbs in it.  Still have it with bulbs.

__

And if you break one you  have to call HAZMAT.  You did realize that,
didn't you?  They contain mercury and any breakage requires professional
remediation by law!!

bill

RE: bbs or crude facsimile of such

[Ali via cctalk]

> At some point a version of BYE was created for the IBM PC, but as far
> as I know, there was only a single release of it.
> 

Any idea if the IBM version is available in an archive somewhere online?

-Ali

Re: Eunice BSD on TK50

[Jason T via cctalk]

On Fri, May 19, 2017 at 3:56 PM, Jason T  wrote:
> I have here a shipping box, a shrink-wrapped TK50 tape and various
> docs for Wollongong Group's "EUNICE BSD," which I take to be a BSD

And for your entertainment, a very early Usenet post on the software:

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.unix-wizards/069-KS5M7Js

Eunice BSD on TK50

[Jason T via cctalk]

I have here a shipping box, a shrink-wrapped TK50 tape and various
docs for Wollongong Group's "EUNICE BSD," which I take to be a BSD
Unix-like environment for VMS.  I can't find a copy of either the docs
nor the bits online.

I will take care of scanning the docs.  I would like to send this tape
to someone - Al K getting first shot if he's interested - who can
image the TK50 cart and make it available to all.  I have a spotty
TKZ50 drive that I'd rather not risk this potentially valuable data
to.

The tape is marked:

"EUNICE BSD Binary Distribution Relase # E-11575-IP.  Users: UL"

Hooray, unlimited license!

Any takers?

-j

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[ben via cctalk]

On 5/19/2017 10:07 AM, allison via cctalk wrote:


Remember a BBS with 1 modem is ruing at less (back then) than
1200 baud (120CPS!).  Name one CPU that can't grab one byte and
act on  it in 8.333mS?  The rest is enough storage to do a useful library
(download and upload programs, and some form of mail and forum/board).



Well I can think of one, but it can't be named on this list.
Ben.

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[jim stephens via cctalk]

On 5/19/2017 5:13 AM, Peter Corlett via cctalk wrote:

Anyway, for those of us in Amsterdam who can actually be bothered to find and
hold down a job, go out and do the shopping, etc, we're replacing blown
incandescents with LED bulbs because that's what they sell in the shops.
Incandescent bulbs are exotic specialist items.
The CFL lighting was subsidized by the local California Utilities, 
because the state has an incentive for Utilities to either build 
efficient plants and expand capacity, or incentivize people to reduce 
consumption by some amounts to offset that requirement.


They are doing  the same for some LED lighting now, though not as much 
as they did for CFL at this point.


At one point I could buy a flat of 60W CFL's for $2.00, which had maybe 
20 bulbs in it.  Still have it with bulbs.


I am however buying for every location I use lighting for any period  of 
time LED lighting.  I think most of my spots have 8 to 10w bulbs which 
are as bright as most the lighting which it replaced.


The main incandescent lighting I want to keep are lights which can be 
used in either traffic lights or have connections to work in home 
lighting.  They are specially made to have much extended lifetimes for 
such, and are handy where you do want to put in and leave an 
incandescent light rather than either CFL or LED.


thanks
Jim

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Chuck Guzis via cctalk]

So, if it's authenticity you want, you'll have to incorporate some sort
of noise generator on the lines.   Telco quality is much better today
than 40 years ago (although you may not think so).  I recall that
calling Sunnyvale from Los Gatos (or vice-versa) was a real adventure in
connectivity.   Los Gatos was GTE; Sunnyvale was AT  I think that
someone once told me that the network interconnect was acoustic (I don't
know if that was true).   But you might as well have been calling
Boston, for the line quality.

--Chuck

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[jim stephens via cctalk]

On 5/19/2017 3:23 AM, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:

On 18 May 2017 at 17:16, allison via cctalk  wrote:

All a DOS BBS was  was a user interface that provided security by requiring
user/password
and limiting the commands usable.  The easy was to do that was a version of
the CMD module
rewritten to not have things like RMDIR and DEL.


I was never into the BBS scene, because outside North America, local
phone calls cost money. So you paid for every minute you were online
-- quite a lot.
I have news for you. (maybe) From 1976 until it petered out, the phone 
time cost a lot too.  $200 or more a month at times.


Also a stupid charge for local calls where the PUC's didn't stand up to 
the Bell system or successors and call bullshit to the charges. Calling 
across a few blocks could cost a lot and you wouldn't know it unless you 
were a phone nut due to zone usage metering.


Only with competition in the mid 80s did US long distance start to fall, 
and now with the internet and voice over IP have the need to pay for 
most such long distance gone away for small users.


I put in a couple of T1 based systems for large offices though as 
recently as 7 years ago, and commercially the POTS or digital carrier 
phone numbers carry a huge toll.

thanks
Jim

I used (and still use) CIX (www.cix.co.uk) which was a sort of UK
version of BIX, and used offline readers -- you dial up, it sends your
comments, zips & grabs all your messages, and disconnects, as fast as
possible to keep the phone bill down.

But AIUI later-era DOS BBSes often used DESQview to allow multiple
multitasking user sessions, and the BBS sysops were often early
adopters of OS/2 2.

So DOS <> no multitasking...

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[allison via cctalk]

On 05/19/2017 07:49 AM, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:
> On 19 May 2017 at 13:36, Bill Gunshannon  wrote:
>> Nope. Take a trip to Amazon and look at just how much power this stuff
>> actually consumes.  And, if you go back to the days when we started
>> running this stuff in our homes, compare the draw of a QBUS PDP-11 to
>> a TV with a picture tube, standard incandescent lights, a refridgerator,
>> window air conditioners, etc.  Our toys draw much less power than most
>> people think.  Heck, I have seen modern PC's (you  know, the kind gamers
>> use) that draw more power and are frequently run 24/7.
Running a BBS I can think of several machines that re power frugal in the
DEC realm alone. 

Vt180 it a Vt100 power needs plus maybe 80W for the VT180 board and
four Floppies.   The total is under 120W based on an old measurement.

A PDP-11 Qbus machine with a 11/23 cpu and a RL02 or a RQDX/Hard disk 
was enough for running TSX and a few people timeshare in an office then
a BBS with one modem would be under utilized.  

A microVAX3100/20 with two 420MB disks would do that easy at under
150W.

Remember a BBS with 1 modem is ruing at less (back then) than
1200 baud (120CPS!).  Name one CPU that can't grab one byte and
act on  it in 8.333mS?  The rest is enough storage to do a useful library
(download and upload programs, and some form of mail and forum/board).

> I wonder if this is one of those USA-vs-Rest-of-world differences.

Likely and also time frame.  PDP-11s had their peak life just like PDP-8s
and VAXen. 

>
> I think I have seen a running PDP-11 twice in my life, and it was the
> same one -- a machine I had to get exchanging files with Mac clients
> acting as terminal emulators, in about 1989 in my first job. It was
> already very old kit by then. I've no idea how much power they draw.
The power draw from from the micro level to the monster level.
For example a PDP11/150 was desktop and it plus the VT100 was maybe
150W, the 11/70 with a few RK07s and RM disks likely reuired a 230V 30A
line or more.

Most of the Qbus 11s (LSI-11 though 11/73) in single BA11 or BA23 box
were in the sub 300 W range as that was the limit of the power supply.
The disks for them could be PC class (early 80s) 5.25"  or RL02 and RX02.

My rack system with RX02, rl02, RD52x2 and 4mb ram and 11/73 cpu is
under 420W(460 with VT330) at 120V.My former towerbox Xeon4/3ghz
with 4g of ram and a 160gb disk ran at 220W (24/7) the LCD added another
55W as a comparison.

I fired up the MicroPDP11 with a 11/23+ and 4mb ram, RD52 and floppy
and a VT320 and the KillaWatt was under 215W for the pair.

For comparison, my current desktop is a Mintbox and its maybe under
full load 12W (with usb keyboard and mouse).  The display dwarfs it.

> Window air conditioners are another thing I've never seen,
> incandescent lights are now a rarity in Europe, hoarded by some
> old-timers -- i.e. older than me, at a hair under 50. I've never
> bought a new TV set with a CRT, either. In fact most of my CRT
> monitors over my whole home computing time period -- nearly 40y --
> were cast-offs, hand-me-downs, or bought 2nd hand.
Led lights, an early adopter as I'm cheap(frugal) so between replacement
cost, heat load in the summer, and power consumption LEDs are cheap. 
I use incandescent for the times when color temperature is important
and LEDs can't cut it.

Then again I power my ham station off grid with 400W of solar and
150Ah of NiCd (industrial) battery.

CRT monitors I still have a few and one TV as its rarely used but
excellent quality.  I use terminals like Vt100, Vt180, Vt320 and even
VT1200 based on need or convenience.

By doing that I have the luxury of powering things like older computers
off of savings.

> I've bought a few 2nd hand LCD monitors now, because I like big ones.
> (Oo er missus, etc.) I'm currently running a 23" + a 24" on a 2011 Mac
> mini with a 1987 Apple Extended keyboard. All bought used. New kit is
> for suckers.
If you can buy it its obsolete, by used or cheap.  Also used is a good deal
by time one buys it the reliability of that model is known.

> So I don't look into power consumption -- used price is more important
> to me, TBH. Probably bad of me, but wotthehell archie wotthehell.
>

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Toby Thain via cctalk]

On 2017-05-19 9:10 AM, geneb via cctalk wrote:

On Fri, 19 May 2017, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:


On 18 May 2017 at 22:06, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk
 wrote:

The plate on the back of my 11/93 says 345 Watts.  That's about a
fifth what your
wifes hair dryer draws.  Or slightly more than 3 100 watt light bulbs



Jesus wept.

Are you certain that this alleged "hair dryer" is not in fact a
hot-air paint stripper? And that the said "wife" is not in fact some
form of robot with a heatproof coating?


I just checked the one my wife uses and it's rated at 1875 watts. :)


Mine's is rated 2000W. And has its own circuit breaker on the plug.

--Toby



g.

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Noel Chiappa via cctalk]

> From: Christian Corti

> I have a similar setup with our 11/34. .. It's not the fastest system,
> and the kernel uses overlays like crazy ;-) ... I still have to add the
> cache and FPP boards and see how that improves the performance.

The cache should help some, but the FPP, probably not (unless you are running
some application which actually does a lot of floating point).

Noel

RE: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Bill Gunshannon via cctalk]

From: cctalk [cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] on behalf of Peter Corlett via 
cctalk [cctalk@classiccmp.org]
Sent: Friday, May 19, 2017 8:13 AM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

On Fri, May 19, 2017 at 11:39:27AM +, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk wrote:
[...]
> But, seriously, just how many households do you think have made the move to
> LED lighting? The amount of energy wasted in the average house, especially
> those with wives and children (your wife never forget to turn off her curling
> iron?) makes the power used by a QBUS PDP-11 pale in comparison.

I have certainly noticed that those who contribute the least to the household
finances are also those who consume the most, yes. If anybody would like a
couple of workshy stoner flatmates, don't hesitate to come and collect them.
Please. I'd appreciate the 80% slump in electricity consumption. (800 watt base
load! What are they doing in there!?)

Anyway, for those of us in Amsterdam who can actually be bothered to find and
hold down a job, go out and do the shopping, etc, we're replacing blown
incandescents with LED bulbs because that's what they sell in the shops.
Incandescent bulbs are exotic specialist items.

___

Incandescent are becoming rarer here, but we went thru a CDF phase
between them and LED's.  Now there was an environmental nightmare!!

bill

Re: bbs or crude facsimile of such

[geneb via cctalk]

On Fri, 19 May 2017, John Labovitz via cctalk wrote:


Another BBS obscurity —

I ran a BBS in the early 80s called The Bethesda RCP/M. Those of us who 
couldn’t afford dedicated lines often used a method called ‘ringback.’ 
This was a clever way to share a regular home phone with a modem.


The idea was that if you wanted to dial up to the BBS, you’d call my 
number, but hang up after one ring, then call back. The software (BYE, 
as someone else here mentioned) would be monitoring the ring-detect line 
on the modem’s serial port, and watch for ring patterns. If it saw a 
second ring within ~4 seconds, it would ignore the call, assuming it was 
a voice call; otherwise, it would send the Hayes code to answer the line 
(ATA). It’s weird how I still remember all that logic, 35 years later...




I recall seeing the feature in BYE, but this is the first time I've heard 
of someone using it.  Neat! :)


For those that don't know what BYE is, it's basically a fancy I/O 
redirector for CP/M.  It would handle the serial comms and a few other 
things, and redirect I/O from the serial port, to the console.  This meant 
that you could run BBS software that didn't have any serial I/O.  The 
first versions of RBBS were like this - simply compiled BASIC with regular 
INPUT and PRINT statements.


BYE was written in 8080 assembly (I think MBYE was Z-80, but I'm not sure) 
and used an "insert" for the type of computer you were going to use it on. 
The insert contained code for all the machine-specific features that BYE 
needed (serial port control, 25th line support for status bar, etc.).


At some point a version of BYE was created for the IBM PC, but as far as I 
know, there was only a single release of it.


g.


--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home.
Some people collect things for a hobby.  Geeks collect hobbies.

ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

Re: bbs or crude facsimile of such

[John Labovitz via cctalk]

Another BBS obscurity —

I ran a BBS in the early 80s called The Bethesda RCP/M. Those of us who 
couldn’t afford dedicated lines often used a method called ‘ringback.’ This was 
a clever way to share a regular home phone with a modem.

The idea was that if you wanted to dial up to the BBS, you’d call my number, 
but hang up after one ring, then call back. The software (BYE, as someone else 
here mentioned) would be monitoring the ring-detect line on the modem’s serial 
port, and watch for ring patterns. If it saw a second ring within ~4 seconds, 
it would ignore the call, assuming it was a voice call; otherwise, it would 
send the Hayes code to answer the line (ATA). It’s weird how I still remember 
all that logic, 35 years later...

I used ringback for my BBS for a few weeks until my parents got so annoyed at 
late-night telephone rings (with those loud clapper bells) that they paid up 
for a dedicated line.

—John


> On May 19, 2017, at 6:13 AM, jim stephens via cctalk  
> wrote:
> 
> When I got my first system running, S100, I had an Imsai 8080 with a Hayes 
> 103 modem.  I used it to log into multics and some BBS's at the time and 
> record sessions and files and the like.  I only had the usual 8" floppies, 
> with eventually 1mb x 2 for storage.
> 
> However, reason for mentioning was that there was a simple program which 
> would auto answer on the Hayes modem and allow you to run things.
> 
> One evening when my roommates and I had gone to dinner, a friend who was 
> going to call at a certain time did so.  However we had forgotten he was to 
> call, and I had left the system up and connected to the phone.
> 
> He called a couple of times and realized that we weren't around to pull the 
> line, or call back, so he got his terminal up and running and left us a 
> message on the screen for later.
> 
> I sort of count it as the first sort of BBS type I ran.  There was a program 
> you could leave running which would challenge for a password, and then re-run 
> when the modem lost signal, so you could have a low grade login that way.  
> (password only).
> 
> And one could take ones choice of files and xmodem them (which he did in 
> future sessions).
> 
> I logged into many BBS systems which weren't much more than this or a 
> restricted menu program after you logged in.  Some were nice with some 
> presentation, and some were just (enter 1 to do ... 2 to do ... etc).
> 
> Not much else really required if you want to get to very basics.
> 
> With any BBS having more than just the floppies, login and messaging and more 
> download options were the next level up.
> 
> And after that there were various BBS software packages that had networks of 
> like users that one could obtain.
> 
> thanks
> Jim
> 

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[geneb via cctalk]

On Fri, 19 May 2017, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:


On 18 May 2017 at 22:06, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk
 wrote:

The plate on the back of my 11/93 says 345 Watts.  That's about a fifth what 
your
wifes hair dryer draws.  Or slightly more than 3 100 watt light bulbs



Jesus wept.

Are you certain that this alleged "hair dryer" is not in fact a
hot-air paint stripper? And that the said "wife" is not in fact some
form of robot with a heatproof coating?


I just checked the one my wife uses and it's rated at 1875 watts. :)

g.

--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home.
Some people collect things for a hobby.  Geeks collect hobbies.

ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

RE: BBS software for the PDP 11

[geneb via cctalk]

On Thu, 18 May 2017, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk wrote:



8250 is a VAX, not a PDP-11.  I doubt it even ran off of 120v single phase.

Um, yeah.  It did.  I bought the machine for $500 from Mannesmann Tally in 
Kent, WA.  A friend and I removed the 8250 from their machine room and 
transported it to my home.  I had two 30A services installed in the 
upstairs of my house and that's where I set the machine up.


They'd wiped the drives before I got them, but they did give me the Ultrix 
install media.  I got it home on a Friday night and had it running Ultrix 
by Sunday afternoon.


Some months later I traded it to a friend that an 8350 in his garage.

g.

--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home.
Some people collect things for a hobby.  Geeks collect hobbies.

ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Peter Corlett via cctalk]

On Fri, May 19, 2017 at 11:39:27AM +, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk wrote:
[...]
> But, seriously, just how many households do you think have made the move to
> LED lighting? The amount of energy wasted in the average house, especially
> those with wives and children (your wife never forget to turn off her curling
> iron?) makes the power used by a QBUS PDP-11 pale in comparison.

I have certainly noticed that those who contribute the least to the household
finances are also those who consume the most, yes. If anybody would like a
couple of workshy stoner flatmates, don't hesitate to come and collect them.
Please. I'd appreciate the 80% slump in electricity consumption. (800 watt base
load! What are they doing in there!?)

Anyway, for those of us in Amsterdam who can actually be bothered to find and
hold down a job, go out and do the shopping, etc, we're replacing blown
incandescents with LED bulbs because that's what they sell in the shops.
Incandescent bulbs are exotic specialist items.

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Liam Proven via cctalk]

On 19 May 2017 at 13:36, Bill Gunshannon  wrote:
> Nope. Take a trip to Amazon and look at just how much power this stuff
> actually consumes.  And, if you go back to the days when we started
> running this stuff in our homes, compare the draw of a QBUS PDP-11 to
> a TV with a picture tube, standard incandescent lights, a refridgerator,
> window air conditioners, etc.  Our toys draw much less power than most
> people think.  Heck, I have seen modern PC's (you  know, the kind gamers
> use) that draw more power and are frequently run 24/7.

I wonder if this is one of those USA-vs-Rest-of-world differences.

I think I have seen a running PDP-11 twice in my life, and it was the
same one -- a machine I had to get exchanging files with Mac clients
acting as terminal emulators, in about 1989 in my first job. It was
already very old kit by then. I've no idea how much power they draw.

Window air conditioners are another thing I've never seen,
incandescent lights are now a rarity in Europe, hoarded by some
old-timers -- i.e. older than me, at a hair under 50. I've never
bought a new TV set with a CRT, either. In fact most of my CRT
monitors over my whole home computing time period -- nearly 40y --
were cast-offs, hand-me-downs, or bought 2nd hand.

I've bought a few 2nd hand LCD monitors now, because I like big ones.
(Oo er missus, etc.) I'm currently running a 23" + a 24" on a 2011 Mac
mini with a 1987 Apple Extended keyboard. All bought used. New kit is
for suckers.

So I don't look into power consumption -- used price is more important
to me, TBH. Probably bad of me, but wotthehell archie wotthehell.

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
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RE: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Bill Gunshannon via cctalk]

From: cctalk [cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] on behalf of Peter Corlett via 
cctalk [cctalk@classiccmp.org]
Sent: Friday, May 19, 2017 6:45 AM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

On Fri, May 19, 2017 at 12:25:44PM +0200, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:
> Bill Gunshannon via cctalk  wrote:

>> The plate on the back of my 11/93 says 345 Watts.  That's about a fifth what 
>> your
>> wifes hair dryer draws.  Or slightly more than 3 100 watt light bulbs
> Jesus wept.

> Are you certain that this alleged "hair dryer" is not in fact a hot-air paint
> stripper? And that the said "wife" is not in fact some form of robot with a
> heatproof coating?

I was more thinking of the several tens of kilolumens that you'd get from 345W
of modern high-efficiency LED lighting. It'd give you a decent tan, for a
start.

__

But, seriously, just how many households do you think have made the move
to LED lighting?  The amount of energy wasted in the average house, especially
those with wives and children (your wife never forget to turn off her curling 
iron?)
makes the power used by a QBUS PDP-11 pale in comparison.

bill

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Peter Corlett via cctalk]

On Fri, May 19, 2017 at 12:25:44PM +0200, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:
> Bill Gunshannon via cctalk  wrote:

>> The plate on the back of my 11/93 says 345 Watts.  That's about a fifth what 
>> your
>> wifes hair dryer draws.  Or slightly more than 3 100 watt light bulbs
> Jesus wept.

> Are you certain that this alleged "hair dryer" is not in fact a hot-air paint
> stripper? And that the said "wife" is not in fact some form of robot with a
> heatproof coating?

I was more thinking of the several tens of kilolumens that you'd get from 345W
of modern high-efficiency LED lighting. It'd give you a decent tan, for a
start.

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Liam Proven via cctalk]

On 19 May 2017 at 00:22, Ed via cctalk  wrote:
> we ran ours first on a hp-2000 then migrated to a hp-3000
>
> final version had  100 boards on it  email  ,  multi  user  chat, poll and
> voting and much more.
> yep it kicked ass!


You'd think if you'd been online that long, you'd have worked out how
to quote by now.

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
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Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Liam Proven via cctalk]

On 18 May 2017 at 22:06, Bill Gunshannon via cctalk
 wrote:
> The plate on the back of my 11/93 says 345 Watts.  That's about a fifth what 
> your
> wifes hair dryer draws.  Or slightly more than 3 100 watt light bulbs


Jesus wept.

Are you certain that this alleged "hair dryer" is not in fact a
hot-air paint stripper? And that the said "wife" is not in fact some
form of robot with a heatproof coating?

-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
Twitter/Facebook/Flickr: lproven • Skype/LinkedIn/AIM/Yahoo: liamproven
UK: +44 7939-087884 • ČR/WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal: +420 702 829 053

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Liam Proven via cctalk]

On 18 May 2017 at 17:16, allison via cctalk  wrote:
> All a DOS BBS was  was a user interface that provided security by requiring
> user/password
> and limiting the commands usable.  The easy was to do that was a version of
> the CMD module
> rewritten to not have things like RMDIR and DEL.


I was never into the BBS scene, because outside North America, local
phone calls cost money. So you paid for every minute you were online
-- quite a lot.

I used (and still use) CIX (www.cix.co.uk) which was a sort of UK
version of BIX, and used offline readers -- you dial up, it sends your
comments, zips & grabs all your messages, and disconnects, as fast as
possible to keep the phone bill down.

But AIUI later-era DOS BBSes often used DESQview to allow multiple
multitasking user sessions, and the BBS sysops were often early
adopters of OS/2 2.

So DOS <> no multitasking...



-- 
Liam Proven • Profile: https://about.me/liamproven
Email: lpro...@cix.co.uk • Google Mail/Talk/Plus: lpro...@gmail.com
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bbs or crude facsimile of such

[jim stephens via cctalk]

When I got my first system running, S100, I had an Imsai 8080 with a 
Hayes 103 modem.  I used it to log into multics and some BBS's at the 
time and record sessions and files and the like.  I only had the usual 
8" floppies, with eventually 1mb x 2 for storage.


However, reason for mentioning was that there was a simple program which 
would auto answer on the Hayes modem and allow you to run things.


One evening when my roommates and I had gone to dinner, a friend who was 
going to call at a certain time did so.  However we had forgotten he was 
to call, and I had left the system up and connected to the phone.


He called a couple of times and realized that we weren't around to pull 
the line, or call back, so he got his terminal up and running and left 
us a message on the screen for later.


I sort of count it as the first sort of BBS type I ran.  There was a 
program you could leave running which would challenge for a password, 
and then re-run when the modem lost signal, so you could have a low 
grade login that way.  (password only).


And one could take ones choice of files and xmodem them (which he did in 
future sessions).


I logged into many BBS systems which weren't much more than this or a 
restricted menu program after you logged in.  Some were nice with some 
presentation, and some were just (enter 1 to do ... 2 to do ... etc).


Not much else really required if you want to get to very basics.

With any BBS having more than just the floppies, login and messaging and 
more download options were the next level up.


And after that there were various BBS software packages that had 
networks of like users that one could obtain.


thanks
Jim

Re: BBS software for the PDP 11

[Christian Corti via cctalk]

On Thu, 18 May 2017, Lyle Bickley wrote:

I run BSD 2.9 on my 11/34C (w/max. mem.) & DZ using (2) RL02s with up to
three TTY sessions. It's a bit "sluggish" (by today's standards). TSX


I have a similar setup with our 11/34. 2.9BSD on one RL01 as root/swap, 
the rest (/usr etc.) on a RA80 (with the backported MSCP driver); also a 
couple of TTY lines. It's not the fastest system, and the kernel uses 
overlays like crazy ;-) But hey, it runs...
I still have to add the cache and FPP boards and see how that improves the 
performance.


Christian